Vehicle spoken dialog systems (or “speech systems”) perform, among other things, speech recognition based on speech uttered by occupants of a vehicle. The speech utterances typically include commands that communicate with or control one or more features of the vehicle as well as other systems that are accessible by the vehicle. A speech system generates spoken commands in response to the speech utterances, and in some instances, the spoken commands are generated in response to the speech recognition needing further information in order to perform the speech recognition.
Increasingly, speech recognition functionality may be provided by multiple devices within the user's environment, as well as externally available servers. In the context of a vehicle spoken dialog system, for example, it is not unusual for speech recognition results to be available simultaneously from the user's mobile device (via one or more applications resident on the mobile device), the vehicle's onboard speech system, and external third-party servers (which are coupled via a network to an onboard communication network). Furthermore, the time necessary for the systems to produce speech recognition results as well as the confidence level associated with those results may vary greatly.
Accordingly, it is desirable to provide improved methods and systems for selecting or “arbitrating” speech recognition results in a speech system. Furthermore, other desirable features and characteristics of the present invention will become apparent from the subsequent detailed description and the appended claims, taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings and the foregoing technical field and background.